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Kitchen Table Kibitzing: Ars Technica urges universities to unite and resist Trump's assault [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-04-19
From Ars Technica, April 17:
The wholesale American cannibalism of one of its own crucial appendages—the world-famous university system—has begun in earnest. The campaign is predictably Trumpian, built on a flagrantly pretextual basis and executed with the sort of vicious but chaotic idiocy that has always been a hallmark of the authoritarian mind. At a moment when the administration is systematically waging war on diversity initiatives of every kind, it has simultaneously discovered that it is really concerned about both "viewpoint diversity" and "antisemitism" on college campuses—and it is using the two issues as a club to beat on the US university system until it either dies or conforms to MAGA ideology.
The staff at Ars Technica first outlines the various actions that the administration has taken to remold, undermine and assault the university system: “The goal is capitulation or destruction.” It notes that university administrators (unlike some faculty) have been largely silent, in part due to policies of enforced neutrality and non-political involvement after the recent pro-Palestinian protests. They point out, rightly, that this rationale does not apply to the circumstances now being faced.
Their editorial then cites to the examples of Princeton’s president, Christopher Eisbruger, and the former president of Columbia and the University of Michigan, Lee Bollinger, as examples of university administrators who have been willing to challenge, rather than appease, the Trump administration’s assault on academia. It urges school administrators nationwide to join them.
[T]he moment demands nothing less. This is not a breeze; this is the whirlwind. And it will leave a state-dependent, nationalist university system in its wake unless academia arises, feels its own power, and non-violently resists.
The ARS staff addresses the elephant in the room — the issue of funding — and treats the disparate developments and reactions to the Trump assault at Harvard and Columbia, pointing out that both of these institutions’ outcomes illustrate “that the only way you have a chance at getting the money back is to sell whatever soul your institution has left.”
The assault on universities and on the knowledge they produce has been disorienting in its swiftness, animus, and savagery. But universities are not starfish, flopping about helplessly on a beach while a cruel child slices off their arms one by one. They can do far more than hope to survive another day, regrowing missing limbs in some remote future. They have real power, here and now. But they need to move quickly, they need to move in solidarity, and they need to use the resources that they have, collectively, assembled.
The ARS staff points out (in considerable detail) the resources that universities can summon to oppose and thwart the administration’s tactics. Those resources include endowments, real estate, trade associations, faculty, alumni, prestigious athletic programs, research contracts, medical facilities and possibly most importantly, the students themselves.
Fair use prevents me from quoting more, but the staff’s statement is detailed and definitely worth a thorough read.
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